South Shore Drowns Curtis with Buckets of Buckets in PSAL Semis
JAMAICA, NY - The tone was set early. Kadary Richmond opened the scoring for South Shore with a triple from the right elbow. He immediately stole a lazy inbounds pass and went in for an uncontested dunk. A few possessions later, the junior guard had another steal and lay-up to give his team a 9-0 lead over Staten Island's Curtis. A baseline dunk by Femi Odukale ended the low scoring first stanza with the top seeded Vikings ahead 16-6.
That was how the game went the rest of the way. There was never any doubt who was going to win after the way it started. South Shore dominated Curtis and won convincingly 75-48 to get to the PSAL Championship next Saturday at Barclays Center.
Richmond set the tone with that incredible start and the energy was tremendous the rest of the way. The way to describe it in a colorful way would be that South Shore hit Curtis with a haymaker and then proceeded to immediately step on their neck.
Richmond and Odukale, both talented junior guards, were all over the court. Richmond had that great start, scoring 9 of his 16 points in the first quarter. Odukale knocked down 3 treys in the game, and he also threw down a couple of athletic dunks. He is generally a fun player to watch and led his team in scoring with 18 points.
Sophomore guard Kareem May had his own highlight reel in the third quarter, including one crowd pleasing spinning layup at the end of a fast-break. May got a couple more steals and finished a couple more lay-ups, scoring 9 of his 11 points in the period. Junior point guard Dwight Davis Jr. came off the bench and added 13 points of his own while also leading the team with 4 assists.
Malik Martin finished his high school career with a game high 28 points for Curtis. Junior Adelye Oyekanmi had 11 points and 8 rebounds
“This was part one of what we’ve been talking about” coach Shawn Marc said after the game. “Hopefully, we can do well in the Barclays to handle part two”
Part two is winning the city title, which would be a big accomplishment for South Shore. They are matched against third seeded Benjamin Cardozo. Marc, who seemed as happy as a dog with two brand new bones, was asked what he thought of the upcoming opponent. If South Shore is as focused as Marcs’ answer to the question, they have a good chance to get the prize.
“Good team, great, great coach. You know, they have a great scheme. We going to come to play, I know that, we going to come to play, I just know that. I’m not taking nothing away from them, they’re a good group of kids, I just know that South Shore is coming to play, we’re coming”
South Shore has coasted in their last two games. It seems like the playoffs have been easy work for the young Vikings. Still, this was only part one of the process as stated by Marc. It won’t be easy to get to part two.
